Slight Detour: Along Wintry Country Roads

It's a glorious scene outside my west window.

Pink sky.

Silvery gray, blue and white mountains beneath all that pink.

Quiet.

When I finished my barn chores about 6:45, the dawn was turning to day. I could see the sun and stars but also a vast sky about to turn blue.

Daylight is expanding, and that is nice.

My friend Simon from Yoke's said to me yesterday, after I had made a comment about the snow: I've got more coming for you soon.

Simon is also a veteran and skilled weatherman who predicts the trends for North Idaho and Western Montana.

He assured me that temperatures will be cold and that this next round of white stuff should be light snow.

I'll hold him to that prediction because I do not want a repeat of the situation we survived earlier this month, and I mean "survived."

Good ol' North Idaho winter worked a number on good olD Marianne, and my body is finally starting to recover from all that shoveling.

So, Simon, you'd better be right about that light snow.

Our snow around the Lovestead is getting like stale bread or dead cookies.

Kinda dirty, mostly brick hard, a bit polished and increasingly slippery where we dug out those trails and just plain blah, blah, blah. Any semblance of beauty is gone in my snow-weary mind.

I've seen all the piles around the barnyard fence and the house for enough days that they aren't very exciting anymore.

Yesterday I took a drive down some country roads in our neighborhood and saw some new snow scenes. I'm sure they are probably as boring to those who live around them as ours here at the Lovestead are for us.

But for me, though, the scenes were fresh, and, for sure, snow in someone else's field or roadside doesn't require my physical labor.

It's there to be pretty for those of us who travel past while in escape mode from their own snow piles.

And, so, I took pictures along the way and delighted in some of the magical scenes, especially in the waterways where it's hard to decide if some snow deposits look like dumplings or marshmallow cream.

All pretty and a fun diversion from the status quo around here.

To go with the photos today, I selected a reggae version of "Country Road," introduced to me by my cousin's husband when I featured "Sunshine" on my blog a while back.

He's a musician and he is privy to a lot more music than I am.

I listened to this version, liked it and thought it had some definite therapeutic value for those of us who would love to be away from our snow piles down country roads and sitting on a beach in Paradise listening to reggae music.

So, click on the song, scroll through and enjoy the photos and dream of days without snow behind us, all around us and yet to come.

Finally, one aspect of winter where I never tire is happening today: ZAGS!